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Police Squad - The dysfunctional police comedy
POLICE SQUAD/ABC/1982/CBS/1991 starred Leslie Nielsen as Detective Frank Drebin,
a bumbling, straight-faced police investigator who worked for Police Squad, an
elite unit of a big city police force.
Other Police Squad members included:
- Alan North as Captain Ed Hocken, Drebin's boss
- Ed Williams as Ted Olson, a police scientist
- Peter Lupus as Nordberg, a numbskull police officer
Det. Drebin gets information from Johnny the shoeshine boy (William Duell),
an omniscient street snitch who always has the exact answer Frank needs to
solve a crime.
The program is filled with bad jokes and silly sight gags. For example,
Drebin and a crook in a
shoot out with Drebin behind a bus bench and the crook
behind a trash can which are just three feet from each other.
At the beginning of each episode, we hear the bold statement "Police Squad
- In Color." Within seconds of announcing "Tonight's Guest Star...", the
guest star is killed and never appears in that night's episode.
"I'd just come from the stockyards. We'd gotten reports of hundreds of cows
had been senselessly slaughtered in the area, but I couldn't find any
evidence. I stopped off for a hamburger and checked in with headquarters. -
Det. Drebin
"We would have come earlier, but your husband wasn't dead yet." Det.
Drebin to a grieving widow
When Drebin drives his car to a section of town called Little Italy, the
scenes through the back window are equally ridiculous like showing views of downtown Rome, Italy and the
Coliseum.
As the program closes, all the actors stand perfectly still as the end
credits scroll role across the screen.
TRIVIA NOTE:
The Police Squad spawned three theatrical films,
including The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988); The
Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear (1991); and Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final
Insult (1994).
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